AVLIC & Alberta (Calgary and Banff), Canada (July 15-20, 2012)

Carolyn's Stampede Shirt!

We headed to Calgary this year for AVLIC (the Association of Visual Language Interpreters of Canada) Conference.  We made it into town with a lot of day left (it is only an hour and a half flight from Salt Lake City), and we had hoped to check out the Calgary Stampede.  I did everything I could to find tickets to something, the rodeo, the concert, anything!  But they had been sold out for some time.  It is quite the event up there.  It wasn’t easy to find rooms with the Stampede going on, but we found a place.  We were staying very close to the airport – in a Marriott, of course! 

We headed downtown, it wasn’t hard to find where we were going, we just followed all the cars.  Unfortunately, it was pouring rain!  We found the stampede, and realized most of what we could actually get into was uncovered.  We decided against tromping around in the rain, so we headed back towards the hotel, found a Wendy’s restaurant to eat at, and called it a night. 

We headed out early the next morning to Banff.  It was about an hour and a half from Calgary, and it was a beautiful drive!  I have never seen the Rockies from that angle before… they were huge and majestic!  The fields, the forests, the hills, it was all lovely. 

Banff was a quaint little town.  It had a Park City feel, with fewer high-class resorts, more camping, and less elite.  It is a popular vacation destination for Canadians.  We walked around town, picked up a few souvenirs, ate fancy Thai food, and checked out the sights.  We visited the Fairmont Hotel.. Wow!  What a hotel!  We thought what a nice location for a wedding (and imagine, we could even get married there :) There were many chocolatiers in town and we ate lots of chocolate!  We were sad to leave, but had to head back into town for the opening reception. 

Carolyn and her hot, new boyfriend! 

Holly - Trying to get the perfect shot! 

During the reception, we played dress up and had a fun picture taken with the gals.  AVLIC is much smaller than RID (probably about 300 people in all), which made it more comfortable and easier to meet and greet. 

It was a great conference.  We were able to see Marty and Carol in action during their presentations (Marty presented on both Interpretation Skills, Novice to Expert Characterizes and Leadership Applied to Team Interpreting and Carol on Creativity and Expertise in Interpreting) It was fun to be there and support them during their presentations.  I was especially fascinated by the work we do and the interpreting process during the plenary with Juan Carlos Druetta from Argentina… He presented in International Sign Language, Nigel Howard was on stage next to him interpreting into American Sign Language (and with both facing forward, that can be a difficult job), an interpreter on the front row was copying Nigel for the LSQ interpreter who was platform interpreting for the LSQ users.  On top of this, Christopher Stone was interpreting into spoken English directly from Juan with his lovely British accent. 

We drove with Marty to the bus station to pick up Diane who had come in from Edmonton.  We had a lovely dinner at the top of the Calgary Tower while we discussed Carolyn’s book and the ideas for design, publication, and marketing.

We were scheduled to leave on Saturday, but as luck would have it, we found tickets to see Katherine Jenkins on KSL!  She was scheduled to sing with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and we didn’t plan to miss the show!